unravelings
by MintiNeko
Summary: The Sakura of Sasuke's mind is both crueler and more beautiful than the real one. But things are starting to change.
1. frayed edges

Spoilers for chapter 483, in case you haven't read up that far yet.

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**unravelings**

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"You know, you're a total ass."

The Sakura in Sasuke's mind is more beautiful than the real one, but also crueler and harsher in her words.

Sasuke doesn't like to visit her. She holds all of his memories of the real Sakura, everything he had ever felt in regards to her—annoyance, protectiveness, friendship, and a whole other tangled mess of emotion that he refuses to investigate or name. Even being in her presence for a short time means that the barrier erected to block out his memories thins dangerously, forces him to review old recollections and discomfiting promises.

There's a Naruto in his head too, but Sasuke isn't half as afraid of him. The only feelings he brings to mind are the drive to improve to defeat him, to crush the other boy to a pulp.

That Naruto hasn't been seen in a while, and it hasn't occurred to Sasuke to wonder why.

"You are, to honest, much worse than an ass. You're also the stupidest thing to ever walk the path of a shinobi." continues this Sakura. Her hair is longer than her real-life counterpart, Sasuke notes idly how she runs her fingers through it, uncaring of how it stretches the skin on her face taut or how it exposes that forehead she used to hate so much.

"Do elaborate."

Really, he doesn't know why he visits her at all. She's still annoying and worse, because she's not real.

"You asked her to kill someone who had never harmed her, and was bleeding to death in the dirt. Someone who also loved you." She snorts lightly, looking down at him from her position on the bed. "And you think you know her so well."

On some level, Sasuke is offended. He knows Sakura very well. Why shouldn't he? He's been talking with her for years, now.

"You are horribly injured, being manipulated by that bastard of an ancestor, have a dying teammate who did and does still have valuable skills—" Sakura ticks off his circumstances on her fingers, holding them up and wiggling them at him. "And here she comes, all offering to join you, to help you—granted, she was actually on a mission to kill you, but I don't think it lessens the overall impact. You could have handled this lot better than you did. Ass."

Sasuke scowls and turns away from her, wondering idly how long this bout of madness will last. He doesn't fully understand his own mind's workings, and why they bring him to have this pointless conversation with a version of a girl who was an old teammate whom he just attempted to kill.

"Hey, don't look away from me."

This Sakura's angry now, and footsteps indicate that she has stood and crossed to grasp the bars of her cell door, as she is wont to do when she gets impassioned. He turns to look at her properly, fully. He likes how this Sakura looks when she gets angry: she looks dangerous. Someone worthy of challenge, someone he can acknowledge. The true Sakura doesn't look like that at all.

"Wrong," says this Sakura, and she's smirking at him now. She always knows his thoughts—she exists in his head, of course she knows his thoughts—and he chooses to listen.

"How am I wrong?" he asks, humoring her. Indulging her.

"She's really strong," says this Sakura, smirk growing wider. "You like getting me angry—wait till you see her again. She won't hold back. Maybe she'll actually kill you." There's a note of sadistic glee in her words.

She leans forward a little, bangs dipping in front of her eyes. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Her eyes are half-lidded, lips curved up in a sweet smile.

Sasuke can feel his anger rising, and he stands, walking right up to her cell, until there are only inches separating them. She cannot touch him, has tried, has failed. When he was younger, sometimes he would let her. Now, he doesn't.

"It does not matter. I will not encounter you again. If I do, I will kill you." Sasuke looks Sakura right in her too-dark eyes, "You don't matter to me."

"Wrong again." This Sakura laughs, full and throaty and a little sad too. "Well, sort of. You don't care anything for me. But you care for her very much."

She reaches out, and against all expectations, all prior experiences, her fingers gently graze his cheek.

"You made me as a substitute, don't you remember?" She's still smiling, but it's slightly broken. "To visit when you were lonely, and to let others lock me away with greater ease. I'm not really Sakura Haruno. You gave your memories of her a form—as you did every memory of every person you have ever loved. The better to lock away and render yourself a blank slate."

Her hand cups his cheek. Sasuke can feel the roughness of her palm, the gentleness of her touch.

"But you've seen her," her voice changes—it is lighter, almost giddy. She starts to laugh like a little girl, not like the woman she has been playing. "You've seen her, and I will cease to be, and it's already happening, and you still don't understand, you foolish boy."

"What don't I understand?" He finds himself asking.

There are tears running down her cheeks. But she's still smiling. Her thumb brushes over his cheekbone, still achingly gentle. Her hair looks shorter, and are her eyes starting to lighten…?

"It's already starting," she says softly, "You are coming back."

She then punches him in the jaw.

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Sasuke jolts awake in the forests, breathing hard, his heart racing.

Sakura—the real Sakura—is still on his mind.

After years of a pointed refusal not to think of her, not to consider her in any equation—he finds he cannot stop.

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At this point, I'd just really like to see what the hell is going on in Sasuke's head, as it really can't be pretty.

Reviews?


	2. cut seams

So this is a continuation of the last part that got in my head. It's kind of old, and will probably be proven AU very quickly, but oh well.

For the curious: read on!

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The next night, he finds himself in front of her cell yet again.

"That was very rude of you, I wasn't done speaking yet." She looks healthier today—more color in her face. Her hair is cropped to her chin now, enough that he can see the blue handprint around her neck, if he looks. Therefore, he is very careful to maintain eye contact, even if the eyes are cold and green and nothing like he remembers.

Sakura scowls at him, annoyed. "Not man enough to see your own handiwork? Really, Sasuke-kun—I expected better."

"Why am I even here?" Sasuke wonders aloud, annoyed at how his own mind refuses to recognize his demands. He knows his body is asleep, he knows that he has far more important things to worry about than an imaginary conversation with such an unimportant teammate. "I don't need to talk to you. I don't _want _to talk to you."

"Sasuke-kun, this is your subconscious. It knows what you really want, even when you yourself don't." Sakura makes a great show of rolling her eyes and yanking hard on her own hair. Sasuke can see the bruising darken further.

"Clearly," continues Sakura, "You have some subconscious urge to talk to the real Sakura, but since your conscience fails to recognize her importance, your subconscious is trying to compensate."

Sasuke scowls, "That explanation hardly sounds accurate."

"Well, don't blame _me_ for it," Sakura flops down on her cot with a small huff. "As I am but a product of your subconscious so is my answer. Don't like? Read a book and find an actual answer. It's more productive than these little snits you keep getting into."

"_Snits_?" Sasuke snarls, offended.

"I get that you don't want to go home—and much as I hate to say it, you have semi-legitimate reasons not to," Sakura sits back up, rakes a hand through her hair. "But why do you keep acting so melodramatic? Just talk to them."

No need to ask which "them" she speaks of. And he is _not_ melodramatic.

"They don't listen." Sasuke looks away again, attempting to avoid the subject by ending the conversation.

Sakura, however, is undaunted. Sasuke hears her sigh, then springs creak as she raises herself off the cot. Footsteps indicate that she is standing in front of the bars, and he's half-tempted to look, but his self-control is strong enough to ensure that he does not.

At least, until he hears the iron snap in half.

Sasuke jerks around to face Sakura's cell. Sakura's own face mirrors his surprise—for so long he has been stronger than her.

He remembers her words from the other night, and is forced to accept their truth.

He doesn't always understand what this Sakura represents—his desire to control his emotions? To keep back the ties he swore to destroy? Or just her—but he can guess what her freedom means, this breaking of barriers.

"Well, would you look at this?" Sakura sounds more amused than anything else, and Sasuke watches as she climbs sideways through the cell door that has been her bane the past year and a half.

He tenses up when she approaches, wondering briefly if she's going to hit him again. He can always stop her—that's not his concern—but rather…

Well.

He's so used to having control over what this Sakura can and cannot do; it's unsettling to think otherwise.

But this time Sakura does not hit him. Instead, she crouches down, settles herself down by his side. She's smiling a little, and Sasuke finds it nigh impossible to look away.

"You might as well look at me," she says, as Sasuke breaks eye contact and his gaze shifts to her other aspects: hair, nose, mouth. "You've worn your body out so thoroughly that it'll be a while before you can force yourself to wake up." She sounds almost…sad, that he is so weak.

Sasuke would normally be cutting at such an open display of pity, but finds that he feels suddenly tired, deep in his bones.

"This is pathetic," he whispers; a one word description of general state of affairs, not just mental.

"Quite so," agrees Sakura, shifting a bit so that they are actually pressed against one another. It's still a dream, but the feel of her body resting against his is disconcertingly real. Even more so the finger that runs down the seam of his shirt, down his chest, leaving a burning trail in its wake.

"I know you, Sasuke-kun." She informs him. "So I'm just going to give you some advice, and let you think it over. Find Sakura. Talk to her _properly_. Use everything you can to get her to listen. Chains, chakra string, whatever. She can heal herself of minor injuries. Answer her questions. Ask her a few. Then, fight."

Sasuke stares at her, for once in honest confusion.

"Fight? I would _kill_ her."

And despite actions to the contrary, he really doesn't want to. Threatening her, making her cry—all matter of course. But not killing her.

Sakura clicks her tongue against the roof of her mouth, signifying her disapproval, and drums her fingers on his arm. "Only if you _aim_ to kill, Sasuke-kun. You are very much an instrument of your own control. Besides, I mean a battle of skills. A showcase, if you will. You've never seen her fight—you don't know what it's like."

She grins. It is the first smile Sasuke has seen that holds no trace of negative emotion: bitterness, sadness, or anger.

"The two of you should fight each other as hard as you can. It will be magnificent."

She looks dreamy, almost pretty. Sasuke strains to burn the image into his memory as a tenuous link between the past and present; no matter that she's not real.

"So, how does that sound?" She asks, eyes clear and gleaming, almost joyful.

"Your logic is hard to follow," he begins, stiffly. "But such a course of action is unlikely to be a pointless expenditure of my time. Considering other options, you understand."

"Yes, yes, Sasuke-kun. You are surprisingly verbose when you are being obstinate." Sakura rolls her eyes, but she's still smiling, so Sasuke relaxes a little.

"Now was that so hard?" she murmurs, very close, sharing her warmth.

"Aa." Rather than answer, Sasuke simply makes a sound to approximate a confirmation, which is enough. The room he is in fades at the edges, starting with Sakura's cell, and creeping forwards, sucking away dirt and stone walls.

"That's good. Now rest," Sakura whispers, even as she too fades away, her lips gently touch his temple in a brief kiss. "Just rest."

For the first time in a long while, Sasuke truly sleeps.

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…I miss sane Sasuke. And as it is I really, really want crazy!Sasuke and Sakura to have at least one kickass battle before the manga ends. I don't care how many flashbacks or monologues they cram in: just as long as the fight is awesome.

What do you think?


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